Per a report from CNBC, big tech giant Google entered into a partnership with crypto exchange Coinbase. The partners will enable selected customers to use crypto to pay for cloud services. The announcement was made during Google’s Cloud Next conference.

The new crypto payment feature will come into effect in early 2023, according to the report. According to CNBC, the decision and partnership might be aimed at attracting new customers to the Google service by providing them with an innovative payment method.

Google’s cloud services represent a small part of the company’s revenues, most of which are produced by advertisements. However, the steady demand for cloud services and the company’s initiatives to take on the competition allowed it to grow from a 6% in 2019 to 9% in 2022.

Thus, this service is one of the fastest-growing divisions inside Google and its parent company Alphabet. As part of the agreement and contributing to this trend, Coinbase will move its data-related application from Google’s competitor, Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud.

As one of the oldest crypto exchange platforms, Coinbase has been an AWS customer for years. The core of its business revenue depends on its capacity to process transactions from millions of users. Thus, hinting at the importance of this partnership.

Just The Beginning? Google And Coinbase Partnership Could Extend

As mentioned, selected users will have access to the crypto payment feature on Google. Payments will be processed via the Coinbase Commerce service, CNBC reported.

However, the cooperation will expand and in the coming years, other customers will have access to over 10 cryptocurrencies to process payments on Google cloud. These include some of the largest and most popular digital assets in the sector, such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Dogecoin, Litecoin, and others.

The report claims that the crypto exchange was not Google’s first option for the deal. The big tech company was exploring a relationship with payment giant PayPal but ultimately went with the crypto exchange because it “had the greatest capability”.

The big tech giant is currently looking into other ways to expand its cooperation with Coinbase, including a potential partnership to use Coinbase Prime, a crypto custody solution. Amit Zavery, Vice President, General Manager, and Head of Platform at Google Cloud, said that the company will experiment with the product and “see how we can participate with managing cryptocurrency assets”.

All major tech corporations in the world, from Meta to Microsoft, to Google, are exploring or developing a crypto product/solution to get a stronger foothold in the nascent sector. The CEO at Meta (formerly Facebook) Mark Zuckerberg is betting big on the future of digital assets and the Metaverse, competition from other major companies has followed in this and other sectors.